The use of cold therapy, now termed cryotherapy, is ancient. Indeed, Hippocrates is reported to have noted in 400 B.C. that the application of cold to injuries tends to decrease swelling and to reduce pain by producing numbness. The topical application of pressure to injuries is also well known as a cryotheraputic technique. Particularly in sports medicine, today cryotheraputic procedures are commonly used to reduce edema and tissue damage.
Cryotherapy is also practiced as a postoperative procedure in hospitals with the use of electrically powered apparatuses that create compression and which circulate cold fluids. Outside of institutions such as hospitals, however, the use of electrically powered machines is often impractical or not feasible at all as where no source of electric power is available. Also, where long term treatment is needed for ambulatory patients the coupling of such equipment to the patients as they move about is cumbersome. For the foregoing reasons cold compresses of simple construction have been devised for applying cryotherapy in home and outdoor environments.
Ice packs and bandages have provided the simplest forms of cold compresses. More sophisticated compresses have included reusable cold packs designed to be wrapped around body members such as that known as The Ice Down sold by I.C.E. Down Corporation of Delmar, Calif. Exemplary of the more advanced compression only type products is that known as the Air-Stirrup ankle brace which permits normal flexion to reduce swelling. Other devices have utilized small bottles of pressurized refrigerants for introduction into specially designed boots or the like to provide both a chemical cold pack as well as some degree of compression. A cold compress sold under the name Compac has also been recently marketed as an alternate to ice bags. It is designed to be stored in a refrigerator for later use by being molded about an injury.
Though small cold compresses are seen now to have been developed that provide improvements over simple ice bags and the like, they have not been capable of providing substantial pressure. Compression devices have essentially remained in the domain of the larger type apparatuses that are connected to electrically powered air compressors. Thus, were a relatively small cold compress system to be devised by which both cold and compression could be applied in a substantial and yet easy manner, a distinct advance in the art would be achieved. It is to the provision of such therefore that the present invention is primarily directed.